In this volume, R.V. Cassill has put together a collection of his own essays, which he refers to as "a personal, critical appraisal of the crisis of our time as it is reflected, primarily, in literature." As a writer and critic, he is concerned about the prevailing American view of art that equates excellence and quality with price and best-sellerdom. His primary concern is literature, the idolatry of "great books" that confuses literature as art with literature as print, but he also expresses anxiety about other forms of art: the parochial art museum that hopes its existence will cause culture to sift down from the top, and the foundation and government subsidy of the arts that cause all art forms to reduce themselves to an audience-performer relationship. Cassill digs deep into his own experiences in an attempt to pin down and search out answers to the crisis in the arts. His essays will provoke thought and discussion among all those who are concerned about eh present and future of the creative arts in America and will be of special interest to students of creative writing and of literature in general.